Gardening with Kids: Mother Nature’s Curveballs

It’s April 5th. Here in Minnesota, this isn’t really the time of year for gardening. We’re usually planning, cleaning up the winter debris, repairing damage, and prepping our yards for the spring. Instead, I woke up to this:

While I willingly live in a state known for long, cold winters, things are getting ridiculous. The baseball season has kicked off, and it’s the home opener for our local team, the Minnesota Twins. In 2010, a new outdoor ball field was opened. In those prior 8 home openers, we’ve had some chilly weather, but nothing that generated a headline like this in the Star Tribune.

To clarify, on Monday the area received 10″ of snow. Minnesota might be home to the “Icebox of the Nation“, but April isn’t typically a month of snow. Sure, the median last frost is in mid-May, but that’s the low. The dirt should be thawing during the day, not refreezing.

Hitting the curve

Local stores, of course, have already transitioned to summer items like grills and patio furniture. Our local Target has the children’s gardening gear was on clearance already… for reasons. Maybe they are getting space cleared out for the back-to-school sales (I think I’m joking, but I feel like they start up just days after classes end in early June). Speaking of June, the seed packs on display all have it as the month to direct sow these poppy and sunflower seeds. So it isn’t like we are too far behind in that respect.

So one thing to always keep in mind when the weather doesn’t cooperate is that it’s probably just a short-term issue. It happens every year, whether it’s a late-season snowstorm or frost, unending rain, drought, or something else. Averages are just that; if you check your local climatology office you’ll find that it’s usually based on 30-year periods, or something similar. So as a gardener, you need to stay back and wait for the ball… I mean weather. Of course, you can always try to cheat. Here in Minnesota, cold frames are common remedy for the extremes of spring. I have never worked with one, but at it’s most basic, it’s plywood or a few bales of hay as walls, then an old window or clear, plastic sheet on top, ideally angled towards the south.

The raised garden beds from my last article could be modified to include a cold frame, though I haven’t tried. Otherwise, the PVC pipes could be used to mount hoops and then drape plastic sheeting over it. I doubt the plants would stay as warm as a cold frame, but it could add a couple of weeks to you usual growing season.

The boys of spring

With the uncooperative weather, I haven’t been able to get my boys as involved as I would like. I did have one paw through the seed collection at the store yesterday, and he did seem to enjoy the flowers (and thought the beets were apples). I did get a chance to handle some of the packets to figure out what seeds would be good for little hands and look for some toddler-sized gardening tools. I can report that in addition to the sunflowers (which I already knew), the nasturtiums had rather large seeds that would be easy for toddlers to handle. For other vegetables, beans and corn would also work. I would steer clear of things like carrots, as the seeds are tiny even for adults. You would end up with an entire packet in a single hole or a very frustrated toddler.

Once the weather warms up, it will be time to pick up compost and other top-dressing materials for the garden. Since the bags of compost weight as much as each boy, they won’t be too helpful with that. I don’t mind them getting dirty, though, so they could help spread things around.

As far as planting plans, I think both a sunflower patch in the front yard, some edible sunflowers on the south side, and some wildflowers elsewhere in the yard will provide a nice daily/weekly reminder of growing… plus cut back even more on the turf grass. Most of our vegetables will be transplants we get from yearly fundraising sale by a local school, especially the warm-weather ones like peppers and tomatoes. They also have some great seed selections, with lots of heirloom varieties. If you happen to be in the Twin Cities, I highly recommend the Friends School Plant Sale at the Fairgrounds over Mother’s Day weekend.

On deck

Assuming winter ever ends (I’m not ready for the Long Night), I plan on going through the Friends School catalog and picking out the our plants, why I picked them, and describe my experiences with them or similar varieties. I’ll also get moving on detailing how I plan to get my boys involved in the critical planting steps, and resources I’m using for figuring out what they are ready for.

And no, I don’t apologize for the baseball references. It might look like January outside, but it’s baseball season, dang it.

Win Twins!